Old Computer Upgrade

I have what I would consider a nice computer, but is it getting old the way computers age.

I own a Dell 1537 that has a T9900 3.06 processor, 8GB RAM, 500GB hybrid hard drive, upgraded wireless card, Blu ray player and just about every other bell and whistle I could get for it.

The thing is I started a new hobby called photography and noticed it eats up a lot of memory and processing when I use Lightroom and CS5 for editing pictures. Some of the things are real demanding and I was wondering if I swapped my processor out for a different one if it would make a difference.

After doing my research the best I could that that would work is the QX9300. I want to get with the experts to see if it would make a difference going from a dual core to a quad core with dropping down in speed, I think it might but not 100% sure.

Thanks for any input.

 

Download CPU-z progrm and find out what is your chipset. Or google it. Then go to intel site and see supported producs of that chipset.
Quad Core мы dual one/ it depends on their frequency.

But you know, your laptop looks upgraded like it ate steroids. If you sell its parts (like RAM, CPU if you have slower spare Cpu and lesser Ram like 2x2Gb or else) and sell lapop itself then you will have enough money to buy aboout the same laptop but newer one which means that you will have enough room to upgrade it.

 

My chipset is GM45, as I already did all the research that I could and I've upgraded a few things over the years.

I'm just asking about the processor, if switching it would be worth while or not?

Currently have the T9900 which operates at 3.06 and is dual core.

Looking at the QX9300 which operates at 2.53 but is quad core, that would put me similiar to the lower i5's out there.

Everything else is sound as my PCmark7 score is at 2192, not that bad for a platter drive.

 

I5 has TurboBoost while QX9300 doesn't. It comes to old question what is better quad or dual. After intel release I-core people forgot abut this question (almost)
Games like dual one.
many applications already use advantages of multiple core CPUs.

I suggest you to make another thread which name will show what you want to know. Likу "what is better: DUAL T9900 or Quad Qx9300?" Or find any owner of this QX9300

 

Before I start a new thread I'll let this one go for a day or two.

That's the thing you stated, applications take advantages of multiple cores, so this leads me to the upgrade. Everything else being equal I'll see better performance for my editing pictures.

 

I think the money that you'll spend on another cpu might not justify the performance increase that you anticipate. Your current laptop is on a pretty good performance level right now.

if you still want to feel good about the upgrade that you're thinking in doing then you should look at laptops with high level i7 CPU.

or you can see about overclocking the CPU as it might be easier with that Dell of yours, unlike with my thinkpad.

 

If I was in your shoes, I'd probably get the QX cpu... but that's because I like to push the older tech and see how far it can be upgraded.

Whether or not you will see a noticeable difference in speed...
You probably will if the programs you use are able to use multi-core cpu's (despite the Ghz speed on the quad is a bit lower).

I'd say, go for it if the price is reasonable.

The only other area I could see your laptop being improved in would be the HDD.
You could think about getting yourself a 100GB SSD for use in the primary HDD bay and use your current 500GB HDD in the optical bay via Caddy option (and use the Blu-ray externally).

You already maxed out the RAM as far as chipset is concerned (though it should be enough).

 

Core 2 Duo platform and image editing (especially RAW editing) does not work too smoothly together.

I suggest foregoing a 'sideways' upgrade on this old platform and consider a new system/platform based on SNB or IB if you want to wait a few months before you purchase.

What you are looking at is at most a ~60% improvement vs. a 400% improvement from a platform change.

Don't sink any more money in your current system (unless you'll keep it for longer than a year or more), buy a current system and enjoy a real performance increase over your dated platform.

Good luck.

 

Thanks for everyone's feedback thus far. With everyone's feedback thus far I'll just buy a new computer next February or March.

I'll just buy an Alienware M18x with about $4000 to play with, so I can get just about top of the line system when I pull the trigger.

Tiller, what you mean by IB? I know SNB is the Sandy whatever whatever system, but not the IB.

EDIT: IB = Ivy based

 

Sandy bridge crosses the stream and Ivy is over the river?

No, its just the next gen after sandy

Actually you can get a 2.4ghz q9200 and all of these you can overclock to 3ghz, the q9200 is under 200$.

 

Are you sure the Q9200 is compatable with the GM45 board. According to intel I only see the QX9300 and Q9100 as the only quads for me that would work.

 

Quad cores may or may not work, depending on your BIOS. Many manufacturers whitelisted Core 2 Quad's to prevent damage to power circuitry (if quad cores were never intended, you could possibly damage your motherboard's power circuitry).

 

Be better just to buy a new system

 

Note:

SNB=Sandy Bridge
IB=Ivy Bridge

 

Been doing more reading on the boards here to get reaquinted with the language. So much can change in over a two years, I now realize I've forgotten more than I now know.

 

OK, I'm not really on the bleeding edge but I do track it and I wouldn't call the OP's machine 'old' at ~2 years old. Also with the upgraded spec in their sig, I think the OP might be disappointed in how little real progress has been made in the interim.

 

See:
PassMark - Intel Core2 Duo T9900 @ 3.06GHz - Price performance comparison

PM score: 2301


See:
PassMark - Intel Core i5-2430M @ 2.40GHz - Price performance comparison

PM score: 3478


Increase in performance: over 50% for less than $400 with warranty, Win7x64 licence and up to 8GB RAM (for that price).


If we opt to go for an i7 QM series model (at around $800) we get scores like this:

See:
PassMark - Intel Core i7-2670QM @ 2.20GHz - Price performance comparison

PM score: 6787


Or almost 3x the performance of the definitely 'old' platform.


Disappointed in how 'little real progress has been made in the interim' will not be on his/her mind for the cpu intensive tasks that his workflow requires.

 

LOL. I see your point but it is hugely funny when I think that my GT 330m is ancient and I7-740Qm is old while you say that the progress is minor. My quad was not so better dual I5 while sNB i7 shows to I5 who is the boss here
But for browsing, 3-year old games and office his machine is OK.

 

Thanks for the links Tiller.